“Oh.” Jessica clutched her heart, which was now hammering against her ribcage. “Well…maybe we can help you, too? Lucy, and Dara, and me. If we can find this master we’re looking for and kill her, maybe we can find and kill yours, too. Assuming it’s not the same one, anyway...” She drew in a sharp breath. “Ooh, you don’t think it’s the same one, do you?”
“No,” Nathan said immediately, “it is not.”
“But how can you be—”
“It cannot be her.”
Jessica didn’t appreciate his snappish tone, but she decided to ignore it. “Okay. We can help you find the right one, then,” she reiterated. “We can help you get rid of her. Then you’d be human again, too! Um…if being human again is even something you’d be interested in, that is...”
Oddly enough, this seemed to rile him up even more. His eyes blazed, and his lip curled. “Of course I would be ‘interested,’” he seethed. “Do you think I enjoy being one of these disgusting things?”
Jessica blinked. “Well, I don’t know. There are probably perks to vampirism, aren’t there? Like super-speed and super-strength?” She watched him carefully, wondering if he would mention anything about what’d happened that night with Mr. Hambly and the vending machine and the Ruffles, but he didn’t.
He said, “Yes, and I am also immortal. But at what cost? I must imbibe the blood of living beings in order to maintain myself. I will never again see the light of day, never feel the warmth of the sun against my skin. And do not forget that existing forever also means I am doomed to watch everyone I ever care about grow old and die while I go on without them. Alone. Terribly alone. It is nothing short of torturous, believe me.”
Jessica gave a grave nod. Not that she was surprised, but he was making being undead sound like a real drag.
“I can never be normal,” he continued, his voice a sullen rasp. “I can never do normal things such as…” His melancholy cobalt gaze flickered over her again. “Such as ask a pretty girl out for a cup of coffee. And not only because I cannot drink coffee, but because I would have to worry about what might happen to the pretty girl if she were to become involved with me, an inhuman, unnatural being whose very existence endangers her own.”
Jessica’s ears perked up at that. She grasped a lock of her hair and twirled it around her finger. “Oh, I don’t know, Nathan,” she said. “I say go for it. Ask her out anyway. That girl might be more daring than you’d think. Maybe she’d be down with risking a little danger to be with somebody like you? Hypothetically speaking, of course.”
The vampire shifted Wilhelmina away from him and got up from the couch. “I am sorry, Jessica,” he said, “but I cannot help you.”
“What?” Jessica couldn’t believe her ears. “Wait a second. You mean you’re not going to tell me how to find the master vampire? How to kill her?”
Nathan looked down at her in a superior and pitying way, as if she were dim-witted. “Assuming she exists,” he growled, “you cannot find her. You certainly cannot kill her.”
Jessica stood up, too. “So that’s it?” she cried. “You’re the only person I can possibly talk to about this, and you’re just gonna walk away without even giving me any advice on what to do next?”
He stared at her, his eyes flashing. “Oh, I can give you some advice,” he said. “Stay out of this. If what you have told me is true, then...Leave your friends to their own devices, lest you risk being dragged down into the horror that is inevitably to come right alongside them.”
Jessica was appalled. “You mean I should just abandon them to their fates? Oh, that would be really nice of me, now wouldn’t it?”
He moved in closer to her, lowering his voice as though someone might overhear what he was about to say next. “Listen to me, Jessica. I wish there was something I could do for you, truly I do, but…I am in hiding. Not only for my own sake, but for that of my family. Do you understand?”
Jessica gulped, feeling woozy at his sudden closeness. He was so near to her, she could see the flecks of violet in his deep blue irises, could make out the faint shadow of stubble just emerging along his jawline. “Y-you have a family?”
“The current generation in my line are all young adults. Vulnerable humans with their entire futures ahead of them. But if my master knew where to find them, they would be in terrible danger. I cannot risk doing anything that would call her attention to myself or, by association, them.”
A pang struck Jessica’s heart. “Ohhh,” she said, “I get it. So it’s not that you haven’t been able to find and kill your master, it’s that you haven’t even tried. You don’t want her to know where you are.” Pain flared in Nathan’s eyes, and Jessica shook her head. “Well, never mind then. Forget I asked you for anything and, uh, thanks for coming over.” She waved hastily toward the door.
He followed her hand gesture, disbelief coloring his eyes. “You…wish for me to leave?” he asked. “Just like that?”
“You obviously can’t get involved in this,” she said, wringing her hands. “I wouldn’t want you to get your family killed for our sake. I mean, come on!”
He paused, blinking. “But…what will you do, then, you and your friends?”
Jessica shrugged, still feeling terrible for having made him come over here in the first place, and putting him at risk of exposure to his evil master. Although how was she supposed to know he was in the vampire version of witness protection? He should’ve said something sooner. “Don’t worry about that. It’s not your problem. We’ll
